


Love is for Children

by orphan_account



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Character Death, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Suicide, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-19
Updated: 2014-07-16
Packaged: 2018-02-05 06:39:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,031
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1808983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She always said love was for children. She never denied loving him, though.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

  
She held him close, reveled in his warmth, reassured herself she was still there.   
  
He killed, countless blank faces, sniped and shot and hit every time to protect her. Only her.  
  
She seduced, trailed milk white fingers up faces, poisoned and lied and assassinated quietly in the dead of night. For him.  
  
Both broken  _(do you know what it is to be unmade)_ , hiding away love  _(love is for children),_ looking for the next time they can gaze upon the other.   
  
  
  
They aren't pretty. They are scarred. It is nothing like spy-movies where they are glamorous and beautiful and perfect. It isn't high-life and adrenaline, guns-gadgets and dresses. It's dirty-corruption and killing, fucking-breathing and terror. That's their life. Each mission, is another desperate gasp, a choked breath of air, a struggle for life. 

So each time they complete a mission, they come back to each other, and touch. They remind each other that they are still human, that they are still mortal, that there are things worth living for.

They've never had sex. Not because they can't biologically, not because they don't want to, not because they don't love each other.   
Well.   
  
He remembers no-arousal, confusion, terror, and fucking until he's raw. He remembers pain and fear and being used, one person after another. He remembers gags and sweat and sour breath and leather. He remembers passing out, and waking up to - _i_ t- still going.  
  
She remembers disgust, shame, fear, and pretending to  _love it._  She remembers pressure and countries at stake (Mother Russia forgives no one) and dirty old men fucking her. She remembers heels and guns and tobacco teeth and hairy bellies. She remembers killing each one, and crying over the ones she loved.  
  
  
      ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________  
  
  
  
"Clint."  
"Yeah?"  
"Don't you ever do that again.  _Ever._  Do you understand me?"  
Her voice was ice and spikes barricaded to hide fear. The blood didn't seem to stop leaking from his body.  
He laughed wetly.  
"Don't know if I'll get the chance."  
  
  
  
He pulled through. Eventually. He kept the bullet scar ( _she traced it every time they touched)_  and promised never to do it again.  
  
      ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________  
  
 _They kissed. Softly. Sweetly. Gently.  
_ " _I thought you said you don't love." he asked._  
 _"No, I said love is for children." she replied._  
 _"What's the difference?"_  
 _"I'm a child."_  
 _He laughed and laughed until he couldn't continue._  
      ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________  
  
It wasn't enough. He stared in disbelief because no one-  _no one_  should(can) kill the Black Widow. He doesn't  _understand._ Her skin is pale, and blood is seeping out of the hole in her head. He is shaking, and there is no sound left in the world. Detachedly, he notices that Tony has landed beside him, carrying Steve. He ignores them. The Black Widow is cold and cruel and harsh. The Black Widow can't have emotion. The Black Widow never dies. The Black Widow never takes a bullet for her lover.  
  
He's right. The Black Widow doesn't. Natasha Romanoff does.   
  
  
(The rest of the Avengers find his body the next day. He'd shot himself with her favorite gun.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In this particular universe, Natasha can't sleep with anyone without killing them. It isn't a trigger from the Red Room, it's her particular screwed-up psych. She and Clint have gone through enough together, and love each other. I suppose you could classify them as asexual in a way. The difference is, they would be perfectly willing to have sex, if it weren't for the multiple triggers.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. I originally intended this to be a one shot.  
> My muse disagrees. So here you go!

Even Tony was silent on their way back to the Avenger's Tower. Surprisingly, Bruce broke the silence.  
"Clint. You know we're here for you." he murmured.  
Clint glanced at him. His face was stone-cold, without a trace of emotion.  
"I know," he said dispassionately, and left them.  
  
They grieve together.  
They grieve not, for the Black Widow. Not for Agent Romanov.  
For Natasha. For  _Nat.  
_  
Things couldn't have gotten any worse. (Steve should have known that things can  _always_  get worse).  
Thor was the one to discover Clint lying slumped on the roof. He bellowed for the other Avengers and they stared in disbelief because they had already lost one member of their family but losing another? Fate was a cruel, cruel mistress. They gathered together in a group hug, unable to even cry from the shock. Eventually, they gathered his body and Natasha's, and buried them in an isolated place, with seeds planted over them. They would have liked the idea of creating a life.  
  
  
In the workshop, Tony is in his inventing mode. He works and lifts and welds and submerges his mind and body into something, anything besides the fact that Natasha had died. And  _Clint had followed her._  Were they not good enough? Was it all fake? Weren't they a mismatched family, made of broken pieces of different puzzles, that shouldn't match, but did, a family that became whole together, not Iron Man and Captain America and Black Widow and Hulk and Hawkeye and God of Thunder but tony-steve-nat-bruce-clint-thor?  
"Tony."  
Tony ignores him and continues manipulating the specs for Clint's new arrows. (The ones he would never get to use.)  
" _Tony._ "  
That made him look up and stop, because was that Tony who caused Steve to make that pitiful voice that he never wants to hear again and oh no Steve's baby blues are wet and Steve can't cry, Steve should be happy and golden and red-white-blue and perfect and whole.  
While his mind was rambling, Steve's arms had wrapped around him and he collapses, and they both slump into the couch.  
And they both let go and Steve is crying silently, tears running down his face, and Tony is sobbing into Steve's shoulder and they cling to each other like a drowning men in a storm.   
  
  
Bruce is just sitting on his bed, staring blankly at the wall.   
Friends have left him. Again. (It was his fault, he could have blocked the bullet. He has failed his friends again. Guilt entrenches his whole body.)  
He is lonely. So is the Other Guy.  
 **"Bruce is sad because pointy arrow man hurt himself. Hulk is sad too. Hulk will save him next time."**  
How do you explain suicide to what is essentially a child?  
Bruce curls up on himself, and cries.  
  
  
Thor has seen many deaths. He has seen deaths of warriors in combat, those of his close friends, and what he thought was the death of his brother. But it still affects him. He sets down Mjolnir and prays silently, to whoever rules the afterlife. He prays that they be together, and happy. He grieves.

**Author's Note:**

> Hmm, I'm in a tragic mood right now. Gah, I should be working on my multi-chapter fic- but I was randomly inspired. Oh well.


End file.
